Basking in the moonlight
by Vladicus
Summary: As I thread trough this world I hear her giggling and everything goes away. M: For possible stuff in the future.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Night's embrace.

'I am Me'. **I** thought.

This is the only thought which I know to be true at the moment, in fact it is the first coherent thought.

'But who and what is me?' I ask myself... This is a conundrum .If I don't know what I am then how do I know I am me?

The V̨͠oi҉d̨͘ I find myself in has been messing with my sense of self, or is it just the insanity and the remnants of human personality finally going mad from the soul crushing loneliness? I don't know and I'm too scared to find out.

„Vlad! This is my name I remember now!"(Vlad)

Huh? Something changed... the V̨͠oi҉d̨͘ is different... it feels like someone is watching. How I know this I do not know, but considering I still exist then perhaps they're not hostile? Perhaps they can help me or at least keep me from falling further into madness. Yes my plan is perfect, I'll try and talk to them and perhaps they can help me. 'BRILLIANT!'

„Oh, interesting a human soul in my domain. This is a first." A feminine voice could be heard from all around me.

Oh she's even familiar with humans. 'Perfect!'

„Perfect? Why is that little soul?" She asked.

'You can read my mind?' I thought to myself. 'This is slightly scary.'

„Yes, after all you're in my domain and you're broadcasting your thoughts quite a lot so it's hard not to." The woman said, her voice full of snark.

„Oh I'm sorry about that... It's just I've been in this V̨͠oi҉d̨͘ for quite some time , my mem-mory is mushy and it's so lonely and-and..."(Vlad) I'm stuttering. 'Why am I stuttering?'

„Relax young one I understand that what you're going trough had been quite traumatic. Dying tends to do that to mortals" The alleged Not-mortal said.

And this confirms it... 'I'm dead aren't I?'

„Yep. And you need to learn how not to broadcast your thoughts around."

„Oops sorry. I don't know how to do that. My name is Vlad by the way." I sheepishly said.

I don't know how I do , but even if I can't see her, I know that she is smirking.

„My name is Night, Goddess of Shadows, Moon and Passion, A pleasure to make your acquaintance Vlad the Wandering Soul" The goddess introduced herself in a friendly tone.

„Nice to meet you too and I'm sorry to impose but could you tell me where are we and why I can't see you?" (Vlad)

„Oh we're in my domain , at it's edges to be more precise, as for the second question? Hmm… You're simply not trying to see me, You're trying to use your eyes to look around but you have no eyes, so you cannot use them to see. You must use your mind to perceive your surroundings." She explained.

What she said made sense but for me who had only used his eyes to see and not some other psionic abilities or anything of the sort, her explanation might as well have been in another language.

"And how do I do that?"I asked, honestly confused.

From my point of view this is a good question but it seems that for her it isn't , if the deadpan tone she is using is any indication.

"The same way you're speaking and listening to what I say."

"Oh ok let me try… I have no idea what I'm doing" I said and focused trying to perceive my surroundings.

' Ok let's try to do this… oh I can see a pale light. Huh?'

"Your hair is pretty"Were my first words I spoke upon seeing her.

I don't know why the hair is the first thing that came to my mind but it is pretty, the rest of her is even more so and just calling it gorgeous does not do it justice. Pale smooth skin with a tiny hint of purple which if I wasn't paying attention I would have said it was just a trick of the light, silver eyes, a gorgeous dark purple hair , a body to die for(and I doubt people hadn't before) and risque clothing which seems to have parts made of some sort of silk and other that look like solid darkness covering her chest and some accessories which adorn her body… Yep she looks like a goddess alright.

"Thank you, and was there any doubt I was a goddess?"(Night)

'Damn it I really need to start learning how to filter my thoughts' I think I embarrassed myself enough for now.

"You're getting better at it, I only caught half of that"

"Yeey. Progress!" I joyously said, all my previous thoughts forgotten as I could sense some of her darkness growing thicker.

I paid it little thought.

*giggles* 'She has a pretty laugh'

"Yes you are making progress however I wonder what am I gonna do with you now?"

"So what are my options? Never been a religious person before. Sure I thought that gods might be real but I never saw any evidence of it being true...Well until now, unless I'm just hallucinating and you're some form of hallucination my mind has called up in order to prevent me from going deeper into insanity." I started to ramble only for her to giggle.

*giggle* She giggled again… the sound is nice. She should do it more often. Her smile is beautiful too..

"First time I got called an hallucination, This is truly an interesting day. Who would've thought?"

"I wouldn't know I'm just a wandering" I said and I could see her want to laugh but she abstained herself

*clap* She clapped and changed the subject back to what will happen to me. I was strangely calm about this.

"Right Vlad! Your options are as follows." She speaks and has my rapt attention, after all this is important.

"First I send you back into the void" She said.

'No please no.' I thought.

"Second I send you to my sister, she deals with human souls and shouldn't be too hard to convince her to take you in and get you reborn as one of her followers. Albeit that would mean you and me will be enemies as her followers and mine are at war currently." She continued, her tone getting a slight edge and the darkness moving around in strange ways.

'Tempting but no.' I thought, after all I don't want to be her enemy . She's been nice to me so far and I want to repay that.

"Third is that you get reborn as one of the races which has sworn allegiance to my cause… You will retain your memories and personality or at least most of it if you're lucky." She presented my final choice.

'Hmm.. Well it's not like the choice isn't obvious.' I thought, I don't know idf she read that thought too but her face showed no change.

"So which one will it be?" She finally asked after a few seconds

"I'll go with the third one " I replied, and like that my fate was sealed.

"Very well, Let us meet again young one"( She embraces me and…

*kiss* "Ah" I moaned in pleasure from the kiss. I didn't think I had a body or lips anymore to feel those things but she proved me wrong.

"You are now mine little one" As she said that I felt myself getting sleepier .

My last thought was "Oh" Eloquent I know but I was still barely coherent from the kiss.

This is how my old life ended and my new life started… Didn't know it would start with me getting religious before even being born, but life works in mysterious way and while she is sometimes helpful, one must never forget that she is a bitch that feeds on your pain and suffering… Sometimes that's the only thought that keeps me going at night. That and the goddess.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: I do not own Shaiya.

Chapter 2: Awakening.

*4 months old*

My first coherent thought was 'I'm hungry.'. The second however was 'Mine!'. It appears that my sister was of similar thought but our mother seemed to somehow be able to position us both on one of her hands, each on a different breast making the need to share milk a non-issue, all this while having her second hand free and doing some light chores around the house while father and who I now know to be my older brother were working.

Oh yes context. It appears that the Goddess didn't lie and I got reincarnated as one of her subjects(with most of my memories intact to booth) so that's some good news, the bad news was that I was now a girl and while I am not entirely sure(learning new languages when you're 4 months old is impossible) I think my name is Vivian and the obnoxious twin sister of mine which seems to live to infuriate me by constantly shifting around is Alara.

Squirming around while mother is doing chores, feeding both of us and somehow keeping both of us in her arm is not a great idea, thing which I have been trying( and failing miserably) to convince my sister in what I can only describe as baby talk. Mother seemed to take it in stride and continue her self-given work while keeping us in her arms without a single care in the world.

"Mother I'm home. Father will be coming back later as he still has something to do at the temple."A boyish vocie interrupted my thoughts.

That appears to be big brother back from helping dad. With what, I do not know as I'm too small to know what the family business is and I can barely understand some parts of his speech. If I were to describe him, I'd say he has the pretty boy look on him, a soft face of dark gray with a hint of purple skin but with a distinctly masculine(if young) look on him, pretty tall(not as tall as mother or even father) , with ridiculously spiky black hair and a kind smile, His eyes are gray however and I'm still not used to them...He's also pretty lean and his muscles can be seen through his shirt.

"Oh good , Sindivar, take your sisters to sleep. They just ate and they must be sleepy. Mother said as she passed us over to the smiling Sindivar.

' _Yawn'_ both of us yawned at the same time as if we just realized we were tired from her telling us and it appears my sister stopped squirming now too.

"Mother you work yourself too hard, take a break and rest, as soon as the little ones are asleep. I'll finish the chores myself. You need to rest." He offered mother . She just shook her head.

He sighs, and I only understand part of it, but the meaning seems obvious.

Mother is (and I'm probably biased) quite beautiful, the same shade of grayish purple as my brother, a kind face, short platinum short white hair(seems dyed ) in a bobcut, gray eyes, with plump lips of a different shade of purple, and a smile that makes both me and my sister giggle with happiness. However that beauty (and a bit of make-up) does not hide the fact that she is tired and the reason for it is most likely in her arms.

Raising children is not easy as I know from experience. They are noisy and wake up in the night quite often and while I rarely cry mother seems to fuss over me a lot more… It's probably her experience with brother that tells her something is wrong. After all ,babies are supposed to be crying a lot more than I do and the fact that I don't, made her think there was something wrong with me. She even called what seemed like a priestess or a nurse(probably both) to look at me and see if I was sick but she said I'm fine(I think, mother seemed to breath easier after the priestess talked to her), however she didn't stop fussing over me more than she did on my sister. A mother's instinct is indeed a scary thing.

As I was thinking this, I seem to have missed the rest of their conversation and now Sindivar was taking us to our crib.

Sister already fell asleep on the road to bed and I was close behind. He placed both of us on our side of the crib(I on the left Alana on the right).

"Sleep well Alana." He kissed her on the forehead , but my sister was already fast asleep and didn't seem to even notice.

"Sleep well Vivian." He then kissed me on the forehead and then left. I felt sleep overtake me a few seconds later

*1 year old*

"Happy first birthday

Happy birthday to you..." The horribly coordinated chorus sang.

Yep it's my birthday it seems.

"Whoa!" My sister exclaimed.

"Birthday?" I asked, honestly confused.

I didn't know they celebrate birthdays in this world but what do I know? Anyway as both me and my sister were standing there with out mouths gaping for most likely similar reasons big brother Sindivar responded .

"Indeed little ones. On the day of the year you were born in your first , tenth and sixteenth year of life you celebrate your birthday." He informed us in a brotherly tone, the one you use to teach your little sisters something yet ren't condescending or mean about it.

Our brother is 17 years old and knows about topics like these...

"Why on those years and not all?" I asked.

"Yesh big bro why can't we had cake eash yea? It looks delizi, delici…" She tried, and failed to form the word but I decided to hep her.

"Delicious sis."

My sister is a fast learner, at one year to be able to speak the language that good it seems , I overtook her however as her pronunciation is still childish while mine is closer to that of an adult… That is because I listen to mother and big brother better while they try to teach us a lot more than she does… Adult mind for the win… And I just realized I wanted to brag about being better than a 1 year old at speaking...I didn't want to think about how low my standards fell after my rebirth.

"Right." My sister said with a nod.

"Now , now girls the cake can wait, but first we pray to the goddess, then thank your mother for making it, and only then we eat it. Father said.

Brother seems to have inherited his looks from father as if it wasn't for father having 1 or 2 white strands of hair I wouldn't be able to tell them apart. The only major difference I could find was that he had red eyes.

We said our prayers and thanked mother for the cake(she's a great chef) .

"Thank you mama!" I and my sister said with a cheer.

As mother was cutting the cake father continued.

"Your birthdays are chosen specifically because of their meaning. The first birthday is always special, because it's your first, after all." He said and we both nodded at that.

"Your tenth birthday is celebrated because at that age you are taken to the temple to check what magic you are able to do." He said

'Magic?'

"Magic!" My sister seems to have asked faster than I did.

"I'll tell you more about it when you're older." Well the world has at least 2 goddesses and while the tech level seems to be pre-industrial from my limited experience they have some interesting artificial lights which I still wasn't able to figure out how they work… Magic seems like a good explication . It's probably not a good idea to try and experiment with magic at my age and without supervision... I might harm myself.

"The last one is then because at 16 years old you're considered an adult by our laws." He continued .

So it seems adulthood starts at 16… Well it's not that surprising as I suspected it when I found out brother is 17 and has his own house(and is not married) and only comes around (willingly) to help mother with chores and look after us. Occasionally mother would try and tease him about girls.

"Now enough with such talks, the cake is not going to eat itself." Mother interrupted and urged us to eat.

We needed no further encouragements as we started eating the cakes and almost licking our plates so clean they sparkled.

It was a good day and Alana and I used Sindivar and father as mounts for a race. Mother couldn't stop giggling but Alana won… 'Stupid Sindivar couldn't move any faster'

All in all, it was a good day . I just wished days like these would last forever.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3: Lessons of the world

It's a beautiful day outside, The birds are chirping, the clouds are out in full strength and it might rain, all in all a decent day in the small town of Carice.

''Now kids, can somebody tell me which are the 6 great races? Vivian?" The voice of our teacher interrupted my thoughts.

The voice came from one of the priestesses which were also our teachers. This particular one didn't look that different from most, Grey skin with an almost invisible purple tint, green eyes, red eyes and a 'robe' so erotic it would have been less shameful to not wear anything.

Huh the priestess must have caught me thinking about the weather.

"The 6 great races are the Nordein, Caelum, Vail, Elves, Humanity and the Orcs from the oldest to the youngest. Even if the Veil and Elves are just as old as we share a common ancestor in the Dumianas" I responded.

In the corner of my eye I could see my sister doing the exact thing I was doing before the priestess interrupted me, and that was not paying attention unless asked a question.

"Correct!" She responded.

Her face scrunches up in a look that seems to convey both pride and frustration, a look which both me and my sister are very much used to… after all, her lessons ,while useful, are nothing our mother hadn't already taught us before coming here .Sometimes it's really good to have a mother that takes your education into her own hands.

* **clap** *

"Very well now can somebody tell us who was the Vail progenitor? Milirra? " (priestess) And I zoned out again *sigh* With my mother's training, combined with my knowledge as a reincarnated person(and weren't some of those a shock) most subjects except mana control didn't even require my attention to pass.

Right some context is needed. Our mother was very protective of us during our accelerated growth period, well accelerated compared to that of humans in my old world, as this is normal(to various degrees )for all races. So not unlike many Vail parents she kept us in home until our accelerated growth period was over(5 years) so that we won't harm ourselves while outside and somehow cripple ourselves if our wounds didn't heal back properly, as during this stage we have some pretty frail bones even with proper nutrition during this period. For an example let's take me, I am 9(almost 10) years old but if I were to compare myself with a human from my old world I would look like a 18 years old. Anyway my mental ramblings aside, that time was spent with us learning all what mother and father had to teach us, from mathematics to history and even a bit of magic theory granted to her from her assassin class.

"Right we're done with history for today and don't forget tomorrow we'll get to unlock your Class and see what you're destined to be " She said and signaled us we can go.

Yes it seems this world is similar to a MMORPG from my old life called Shaiya, and wasn't that a surprise, but there are differences, major ones because except for the basics most things are different to one degree or another. These little things make me think this is just a coincidence, which helps my psyche a lot more to thing that this is not simply a game.

The first major difference I found is the power structure of this world, which has a large number of smaller races and greater races some which I didn't really expect to be there, like the Orcs and Caelum which were NPC only factions in the game, which now appear to have their own smaller kingdoms.

The other major difference is the disparity between our numbers. The Union of Fury has 120 million in population of which only 3 million(if our lessons are to be believed) are Vail and 60 million are Nordein and the rest are minor vassal races which are mostly kobolds (30 million) with a few other races also present and even small populations of humans and orcs. This is due to Vail and elven low birth rates( mother was considered an anomaly with 3 children) which usually means a child, perhaps 2 per couple, compared to Nordein , human or orcs birth rates of 10-12 children on average.

However it seems the class system has remained mostly the same, each species has access to 3 combat related classes and( this is new but not unexpected) several crafting classes.

"We have mana control now Vivian what are you waiting for?" My sister said as I was waiting her near the door.

She is very excited it seems, which is to be expected as magic is fun and mana control is really having a nice teacher lets us use magic under supervision certainly helps.

"You, airhead, I promised mister Sortalasar to watch after you after you blew yourself up!"I reminded her.

What other reason would I wait for her at the door… Oh this reminds me, our education has until now been done at the local temple to the goddess in a standardized course but it seems that like in the Middle ages it falls to the priests and priestesses to teach the younger generation… probably because only they really have the time and inclination to do it, but hey who am I to judge free education?

"Hey ,not my fault I was excited ,mana control is my favorite class."She jovially responded, her smile looking like one of those cliched animes in my old life.

"It's also the only one we actually need to put some effort." ***** **sigh***

"Speak for yourself, I don't know how you have it so easy with math, yes it's not hard but not even I can do all those things mom keeps on giving us inside my head."

My old world high-school education is good for something after all, who would have thought?

"You just need to exercise a lot and it will be easy" I told her.

'I just have more than a decade over you in terms of math exercising so I know what I'm talking about.' I thought in the safety of my mind.

"Yes you're right." She pouts 'adorable' ,I just wish she could keep this face forever, no wonder mom likes to pinch her cheeks when she's like that.

I nodded at that and continued our short road to our destination. We did so alone, as while Vail were friendly, kind and open to their immediate family, lovers and close circle of friends this does not apply to most others even if they are of the same species and our status as oddities( twins are considered an anomaly in our society) didn't really open up a lot of opportunities. Well no harm done , after all if they can't see how awesome my sister and I are then they don't deserve us.

As we approached the designated area for or class, in a small clean space outside the temple we could see, and most importantly HEAR our teacher.

"Come children don't be tardy, today is a GREAT day to study mana and blow stuff up and tomorrow will be even better as we finally unlock your Classes." A male voice jovially greeted us.

"Yes teacher." We responded in a practiced chorus.

Our teacher is really passionate about his chosen subject but unless you've been near him, you would not believe just how loud he can get when in good spirits, because honestly he looks like a librarian without glasses. He is of middle height for a vail man, a rather average face and build, but his eyes, his green eyes had a glint that was only visible when he was talking about magic.

He also never shouted at us and was always encouraging us to do better. Perhaps that's the reason for which even if we started using magic barely a year ago so many of us can do simple magics by now. Not that anyone would complain , as they all love the professor .

"Very well, today we will do something easy. We will try to use a mana bolt on one of the targets which are being brought right now."He started instructing us in his no nonsense yet still friendly tone..

As he was saying that some kobolds in armor were bringing the targets, which looks like mannequins made of rock with some armor on… Oh they look pretty heavy but it seems the kobolds are used to it it by now. They place them like 50 meters or so from a line from which we will fire some bolts I think. Well unless they'll teach us a new spell I doubt we'll do anything else with them..

"Right ,thank you Ros'aar. You and your men can take a break on the grass during the class, We'll need you after the class to carry these back inside" He addressed the kobolds.

"Yes sir" The one that looked like the leader of the pack said in a respectful tone which almost sounded like a angry growl for those not used to kobold language. I then stopped paying attention to him and his underlings.

"Good now are all of you ready? Alana, Burtis and Corrontis you will stay under my direct supervision and try some of the non-offensive exercises as we don't want a repeat of 'Bald Sunday"

My sister and the 2 boys called had the decency to blush, after all the reason most of the class either has a buzz cut or a bob cut in the case of some girls is because they decided to experiment with magic and somehow burned their and most of the class's hair including their own. I barely managed to escape that by hiding behind the teacher, after all I wouldn't like my beautiful white hair to be damaged, even if it's barely shoulder length. I like it and take care of it like mom taught me.

"Yes teacher" The troublesome trio said.

They looked down and we could all see they were even more embarrassed, but I could see my sister was not deterred in fact I think she took it as a challenge. My sister's goal is be a healer while mine is to be a mage so her enthusiasm is to be expected considering this is the most important class to us in order to achieve our dreams… What dreams? Well I want to reach level 70(highest level possible outside of special circumstances) and sis wants to be the best healer ever… Simple dreams but they'll do for now.

It appears that there are 3 targets for 9 of us and I'm last again…. Not unexpected. As me and the other 8 students fired mana bolts, the most simple attack magic ever, under the supervision of The Assistant, a stern and sexy Vail woman with red eyes, red hair and a gorgeous body which not even now has told us her name and we suspect not even even teacher Sortalasar knows even if he hides it well.

Well, it appears that things are moving as they normally do, everyone just shoots mana bolts at the target and are graded based on their accuracy until they run out of mana and then get to meditating.

Oh it looks like the 2 girls in front of me already got tired after 5 bolts each, and they barely scratched the mannequin.

Well it's my turn again. Let's do this.

'Mana bolt'

 ***crack***

 ***crumble** *

 ***crack***

And I did it again, the stone target cracked , and crumbled and my bolt even hit one of the decorative pillars behind it and cracked it slightly.

"Oops. Overdid it again" I sheepishly said.

I could even hear sighs, slight laughing and facepalms in my surroundings… The facepalms most likely come from the Kobolods who now have to clean the mess up… Well it's not the first time I did it so they came prepared.

"Impressive Vivian but you know that Sortalasar asked you to also control your power not just blast it all at full power from your reserves, I'll have to give you an 7." A female voice said, her tone cold.

Well she's a bitch, but she's right Sortalasar did see that my raw power is better than the rest of my class and even better than some people which had gotten proper Classes as a mage, which gives bonuses to magic attacks. After all, control and energy conservation is important on the battlefield. Even so I deserved an 8 at the very least. ***** **sigh*** Not like I can do anything about it as arguing is bound to give me even a smaller grade.

"Yes ma'am" I said trying not to grit my teeth.

She may have some valid criticism, but this does not mean she isn't a bitch which likes to take her displeasure at me because sis liked to play pranks on her and now she is out of her reach to torment.

"You need proper control, after all it's not like you want to get tired after only casting 3 attacks while you're surround by a dozen attackers." She said, her tone as cold as before.

She's a bitch about it but she's right so I try to take her advice to heart.

Oh it looks that Sortalasar is done with my sister and the other 2 troublemakers and is coming here.

"Vivian destroyed the target again?"He asked, as if he already knew the answer.

' Hey why is that the first thing you ask?' I wanted to say but held my tongue, this is not uncommon unfortunately.

"And managed to hit one of the pillars behind it and cracked it too"

"Well she does have the right idea , after all there's no kill like Overkill"

Thank you teacher, I knew there is a reason you were my favorite one.

"Yes however the purpose of the exercise for her was to crack the target slightly in several hits to test the speed of her casting, and her control over mana and while her casting speed and power are above the average, her control is barely adequate"

'Ha above average? My attacks are stronger than some mages from the higher years and I'm just as fast as they are… damn her she really has it out for me.' I indginantly thought, while trying , and failing to not puff up my cheecks.

"Now you're exaggerating, and I think she deserved an 8 and not a 7 for this demonstration, after all it was impressive. For age and from the looks of it she still has mana left." My favorite teacher ever said.

' Yeey.'

"Very well" She said and made some modification on the paper she was holding. She was not looking happy… That kind of body and face are wasted on her.

'Take that bitch'

Oh it seems he's coming here.

"Alright kids are you all done now? The 3 troublemakers have already started meditating so what are you waiting for? Let's get to it" He said that with a dazzling smile on his face… Why am I more attracted to the bitch and not him? Stupid past-life memories and hormones made me attracted to women and barely feeling anything for men.

'Oh well meditation is easy and I can't wait to finally get my mage class tomorrow.' Were my thoughts as I started the least exciting part of the day.


End file.
